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Monday, February 03, 2014

Social Liberal Forum claims Danny Alexander has gone native

The Independent reports concern among Liberal Democrats that Danny Alexander has "gone native" at the Treasury by endorsing George Osborne’s plans for more spending cuts well beyond next year’s election.

It quotes Prateek Buch, co-chair of the SLF, as saying:

“Cuts on the scale planned by Osborne just cannot be delivered. So why should Lib Dems endorse the Chancellor’s straitjacket?

“It is beyond me why Danny would sign up to what appears to be joint Lib Dem/Tory spending plans going beyond the end of the next parliament, when no such figures have been agreed by his own party.

“It is unhelpful to pre-empt the party’s manifesto process in this way. Besides, the plans take no account of the need to invest, or what will happen to GDP. What happened to differentiating ourselves from the Tories?”

The paper also quotes an unnamed "ally of Danny Alexander" as saying:

"These were figures drawn up by independent officials at the Treasury. They are not Conservative numbers or Lib Dem numbers. If he was setting out long-term spending plans, he would not do it in a press release attacking Ed Balls.”

As Stephen Tall pointed out when talking to the BBC - the video is embedded in this Lib Dem Voice post - Danny's enthusiasm for spending cuts has it limits: "He is making sure there are nice little sweeteners going the way of his constituents in Scotland."